


Quaking and Crazy

by GamblingDementor



Category: The Wicked Years Series - Gregory Maguire, Wicked - All Media Types, Wicked - Schwartz/Holzman
Genre: F/F, Inspired by a Hozier Song, Post-Apocalypse, Title from a Hozier Song
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-12-06 23:46:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18227045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GamblingDementor/pseuds/GamblingDementor
Summary: The mad green leader of a secret settlement meets a lost helpless girl who has just lost the man who was her protector. It's loathing at first sight − or is it? There's stranger things ever to happen in the wasteland, baby!Post-apocalypse AU.





	Quaking and Crazy

Fiyero died the evening of the seventh day.

Divine rest, mayhaps, in any case a blessing after the agonizing days of suffering leading up to his demise. Glinda, though unharmed, felt the weight of her guilt suffocating her. It had been her fault, her own foolishness that caused Fiyero to be injured. Without her cries of terror, the ghoul might have never spotted them and Fiyero wouldn't have had to fight it off any way he could. In the wasteland, medicine was as good as a folk legend, so impossibly hard to find it was and immensely overpriced at that, and the radiation bites had taken all his strength, making him weep in pain. She had been close to smothering him with her folded blanket to put a stop to his suffering when he finally gave up the ghost. And so she sat by his body and held a wake for him the whole night that followed, closing his blank staring eyes and fearing for her own life now that it was out of his hands. There was much to think about.

Her first concern was her own survival, of course. She couldn't stay in the shack they had found refuge in forever. She would starve to death, for starters, and furthermore its protection would last only as long as the hinges of the door - and rusty and shaky as they were, that was a bet she wasn't ready to put her faith in. No, she had to get out for she needed a protector, a human one preferably.

Glinda had never learned to fend for herself in the terrible world of the wasteland. As a child, she had grown up among many others in a caravan band and in the good will of her father and mother. When they had died and the caravan had plucked them clean out of any belonging she might have rightfully inherited as their only flesh and blood, she had had to leave the group and had found refuge in a settlement. When years later, the news had come to her ears that the caravan had been raided, Glinda had no tears left to mourn them.

Losing her parents had been hard, but the years Glinda spent in the settlement were even more painful to reminisce. She had been a waitress, thank heavens, and though that had brought its own share of groping and grabbing, it had been nothing compared to the sad tales the bedwarmers told her every night as they spent their last coins on enough liquor to lose track of their own sad lives. Men on rest from the roads considered the women of camp as much their due respite as the beds of straw or the fresh meals served at the tavern for anyone who had the gold for them, and in all shared accomodations, the women were turning a blind eye as their bunk neighbor did what she had to do to survive.

Fiyero had pulled her out of the grime. He called himself an adventurer, called himself a romantic. It had not taken two weeks for him to wheedle her into following him outside of the camp and together they had roamed the lost roads of the wasteland. Why that had been a good idea, Glinda could not tell now, but she had enjoyed his protection so much that it had not mattered. They had had a tacit arrangement - so tacit, in fact, that she had never really known if Fiyero was aware of it. She had given him comfort, warmth, affection, shared his meals and his bed, and for that he had protected her from any and all danger of the wasteland. Surely he must have known she wasn't in earnest, couldn't have missed it, but she had kept her rare tears from him and cheered him with her smiles and her thanks and they had never spoken of it. Now, they never would make the matter clear and that, to her, was just as well.

Morning came and gripped Glinda with terror. She was out of food, which had already been scarce since Fiyero had been made unable to hunt and her own foraging had brought only meager results. Most things in the wild were contaminated by radiations. As a child, Glinda's parents had taught her to recognize the good plants from the ill ones and she had made herself useful on the caravan with the other gatherers but that had been ages ago. On the settlement, tough as life had been, she had been fed and as safe as the circumstances allowed. The skills of living on the road had been hard to remember, especially with Fiyero at her side. Fiyero loved nothing better than to please the people around him and, having pitched his affections on Glinda, had striven to provide her with everything in his power. Many nights, she had spent on her own waiting for him, hidden in whatever hidden nook their campement was to be for their short stay in any location they came across. A thick patch of bushes, a small indentment in a cliff, the lower part of an abandonned building, they had made a home somewhere new every night for the few months she had shared with him. She did not know where she would sleep tonight.

She realized with a grief deeper than herself that she would not be able to properly bury his body. She lacked the strength, the time or the tools. On the caravan, it had been customary to burn the bodies of the fallen. She did not think she could do that either. There was a rumor that claimed that the ghouls and wretched creatures of the wasteland came at night to awaken all those gone to sleep. It might have been silly, but when she tried to imagine coming across Fiyero again, or Un-Fiyero, she could not picture him harming her, not even then. He never had and never would, in life or in death. She would leave her corpse behind without a second thought, she had to. She took everything useful her backpack could carry, some more items that she would hold by hand, very carefully she took his gun and his blade. Fiyero, the body who had been Fiyero was lying on his back in the middle of the shack. She brushed his hair behind an already cold ear. Outside the shack was a large bed of pale purple flowers. She cut one and placed it on his chest.

"I'm sorry, Fiyero."

The plan was now to stay alive. Glinda had never been much of a planner.

She had hated life on the settlement but now that her option out of it, now that her savior had fallen, she came to realize it was her only chance left. Fiyero had a map of their little corner of what had once been a country. She had taken it from his things, of course, but now that she was unfolding it, she wondered what use it was to her. A lot of it was smudged by time and rain, a large stain of wine covering the bottom left corner and anything that might have been underneath, and what was visible bore names she did not recognize. At least she was fortunate enough to know how to read − in her heart she thanked her parents for that. Small mercies against the looming realization that she did not know her way back to the settlement, could not locate it on the map and hardly knew how to read the roads anyway.

She wanted to cry. It had been so long since the last time she had. Her whole existence felt like a bandage wrapped too tight and she wanted to let loose. But would cries better lead her to the settlement? Would weeping give her a home and a bed? She sighed. The only way was through, although through what, she could not say. She told herself she would walk as straight as she could for as long as she could, and surely a home would make its appearance in some form at some point.

She made it ten steps from the tree stump she had been sitting on before her fate caught her. Someone or something seized her from behind and a dirty gloved hand muzzled her startling cries silent. Glinda's heart pounded in her chest and she tried to look back at her taller assailant. A creature − no, a person, she realized − was holding her tight, too tight for comfort, but that seemed to Glinda the point of it. Her arms were twisted behind her back, not enough to injure but enough to hurt.

" _What do you want?_ " The attacker hissed in her ear. A woman's voice, though nothing about her leather clad form would have indicated it. Her face was hidden by a hood and a scarf covered her chin and nose. Glinda contorted to see more but there was nothing but piercing dark eyes. " _What do you know?_ "

She was trying to breathe, trying to escape the grasp of the stranger. How proud of her Fiyero would be now, or her parents. Not an hour into her independent life and already she was being captured, already she might get killed, or worse. She had never asked for this. All she had ever longed for was a safe place to call home and every chance at it had been ripped from her fingers at every turn. Now she might die at the hands of a strange woman in a place she didn't know. What an ending for little Glinda.

"Goodness, Elphaba, let her go. Look at her, she's crying!"

A boy came into view or rather, through blurry vision she saw it now, a short man. He was holding a gun but it was at his side, pointing to the ground. He pulled down his scarf, showing his angry face at Glinda's aggressor.

"She's a spy of the Wizard," the so-called Elphaba replied with mood, though her tight hold on Glinda's arms loosened. "She wants you to feel sorry for her."

Glinda tried to talk through the hand covering her mouth but couldn't. She tried to scream but it came out muffled. The man strode the few steps towards them and pulled onto the hand with mood to free Glinda.

"I'm not a spy!" She managed out. She fell to the ground on all four, catching her breath. How close she had been to losing everything, down to her very life.

The woman threw one disdainful glance at her, then back at the man. There were more of them, Glinda realized, that had been hidden from view behind her. A small group, five people, four men and that tall, bony, horrible woman. She sat there in awe and terror that she could have been surrounded by strangers without even noticing.

"You can't just start attacking random people in the wild you suspect to be spies!" The man who had been her savior was saying. "We've been over this, Elphie!"

Though he was much shorter than Elphaba and plumper too, they fought like equals before her. The woman pulled down her scarf to talk to him and Glinda realized with unease and horror that her skin was green. Was she… ? But none of the men seemed to startle at the sight and Glinda told herself that this must be her natural complexion and not an indication of any monstruous transformation. How odd, how very strange. She had never seen such a thing in her life. She had never seen such an angry thing, too. It was a wonder smoke didn't come off her body when she spoke, so animated she was.

"I can do anything I _want_ , Boq," she retorted with wicked mood, "I'm the…"

But she stopped then, looking at Glinda with mistrust. She nodded at the rest of the men and took the conversation a few steps further and in hushed tones. The man who approached Glinda first was tall, though not as tall as Elphaba, and gave her a cheeky grin that reminded her of Fiyero. Her gut twisted in guilt and shame.

"Avaric," he introduced himself. "And you are… a spy?"

"I'm not a spy!" She repeated. "I'm not!"

"Pleasure to meet, Not A Spy," he said and laughed to himself.

He held up a hand and Glinda thought it was to shake hers, but Avaric pulled her to her feet and began to grab her body in all places, palming the fabric. Next to them, another man was searching through her bag. It passed as soon as it had come and Avaric gestured at Elphaba that he was done.

"There's nothing," he told her when she approached. Elphaba squinted with distrust. "She's just some harmless girl. She has a gun but it's not even loaded."

Glinda had not known that it wasn't. Stupid, she thought. Stupid and foolish to imagine she could live in the wild on her own. She didn't even know how to load a gun. Fiyero had never taught her.

"See," the short man said − Elphaba had said his name, what was it again? Biq? "She's harmless. Just look at her, for goodness's sake!"

And so Elphaba did. Her eyes bore into Glinda's, dark brown eyes thin with doubt and, Glinda thought, a remnant of anger at having been wrong. She had the most revolting and interesting face Glinda had ever seen. A long nose and chin, her face a crescent of moon. The mouth was narrow, smaller than her attitude, a darker shade of green, and it twisted in displeasure as she swirled around and snapped her fingers.

"Alright, take her along, we don't have all day. Mission's been compromised, we're going back to camp."

She set a hard pace that was only matched by Avaric. The other two boys were chattering among themselves some steps behind and Glinda, who couldn't keep up and was treading behind, was kept company by Biq.

"I'm Boq!" He said cheerfully.

Glinda looked at one of the boys looking through her bags and taking out various items, making fun of them, pocketing some. She frowned.

"And… What is your name?"

"Glinda," she replied evenly. "Of the Arduennas."

The caravan had been disbanded years ago and would not ring a bell to most people, but Glinda had never forgotten her parents and where she had come from. Boq had a hoppy sort of gait to him and she wondered if it had anything to do with his size.

"I know Elphie can be a lot," he said, "But she's just very protective of… well, of our camp, I suppose. She means no harm."

Glinda had the memory of her arms twisted behind her back still very fresh in her mind and in the sting that still ached in her body. She didn't reply.

"What were you doing so near the factory anyways?"

Glinda looked at him blankly. She didn't really remember where they had spent the night. Fiyero had been too feeble to walk the last hours of the day and the place where they had rested for lunch had ended up being the place of his final rest. She had not lingered long.

"I don't know. I don't know what I was doing."

"Oh. Do you have any skills? I'm sure you'll love to help out around camp."

She didn't even need to think.

"I don't."

She could feel his eyes on her but refused to look in return. Picking up the pace, she walked right past him, past the two boys who were now playing dress up with one of her scarves, and walked right behind Elphaba and Avaric. They fell silent as they noticed her so near and Elphaba threw her more than a few mean glances but Glinda said nothing and kept her gaze in front of her. Soon, conversation started again but it had hardly been a few boring exchanges on the running of a settlement watch round when she bumped into them and realized they had stopped.

"We're here!" Boq said from behind her but Elphaba silenced him with a glance.

"I'll take her to Nanny," she said, much lower than he had, like she expected a second rain of bomb to fall on the land any second if she was heard. "You go practice. As soon as I'm done, we're meeting in the hall. Mission over."

They had stopped in what looked to Glinda like a desert hilly patch of the wasteland, shrubs here and there, a few sad trees, but as the group dispersed and Elphaba grabbed Glinda by the shoulder, she led her through and the world opened itself. As they neared it, Glinda was filled with awe as she realized that a camp had been hidden from view in a small valley between two particularly steep hills. She was almost certain she might have walked past and not seen it but now that she was being led to a tunnel dug through the hill itself, she marveled at how spacious and ingenious the place was from the inside.

A dozen shacks and containers piled onto one another made a semblance of a settlement. Everything was covered with moss − not so much from a slack cleaning routine than to better fit in with the background from a distance, she suspected. There were people too, maybe forty or more, sprawling across this little hidden nook of life. When Elphaba opened the door of one of the rusty buildings and gestured her through it, Glinda had almost forgotten how afraid and upset she had been minutes before.

"Now, what have we here?"

A fat old woman was sitting in a rocking chair in a brightly lit room. The roof above was pierced with several windows that let the sunshine in, some of them with glass panels, some of them where the glass had shattered. Glinda noted a few buckets to catch any rain. The walls were shelves covered in jars and bottles containing strange liquids and herbs Glinda did not know. There was a large tank filled with dirt and several plants at various stages of growth.

"New recruit," Elphaba said and Glinda wished she had been told that information before, too. "Just the usual check-up."

"Oh, my little lizard knows that Nanny's magic cannot work without the magic wor…"

"Just the usual check-up, _please_." Elphaba's tone was impatient, impertinent, but it seemed to be enough for Nanny.

Glinda was made to sit on a bench and for the next few minutes, every part of her body that could decently be looked at was thoroughly examined. Her mouth was opened, her eyes blinded blinded by Nanny's forehead lamp, she was made to cough, to breathe, to stand up very right to have a look at her balance. After all was done, Nanny looked inside a jar on one of her shelves and pulled out a small wrapped ball from it, handing it to Glinda as she turned to Elphaba.

"Perfect and healthy," she said, "Though you might want to feed her more. The thing is too skinny for her own good."

As Glinda opened the wrapper, she found some caramel inside it. When was the last time she had eaten? She shoved it into her mouth. Delicious, but that might have been the taste of relief.

"You say that about everyone," Elphaba replied, "But thank you."

Glinda was led outside by Elphaba. There were people looking at her with curiosity and Glinda tried to smile. She knew she wasn't looking her best − the past week had taken its toll on her as well − but in any new foreign place it could not hurt to make allies, or even friends.

"Lunch is served in three hours. Come if you must." A pause, then Elphaba pointed to another door that Glinda walked through obediently. "Or don't, see if I care."

Glinda wanted to retort something smart, to let Elphaba know just how needlessly unpleasant she was being and how unappreciated that was, but she saw that the room she had entered was a bedroom and she said nothing. She hadn't slept in a bed since the previous settlement, since before Fiyero. There were half a dozen mismatched beds scattered across the room seemingly at random. Almost all of them were taken already. There was a bunch of flowers in a corner. She breathed deeply.

"Here we go," Elphaba said. She gestured towards the only empty bed where Glinda recognized her backpack. There was no sign of the gun or the machete. "Home sweet home now, darling."

Glinda sat on the bed. It had clean-ish sheets, which was much more than she could say about her bedding for the past few months. The springs felt a bit stiff and she wondered how comfortable she would be, but it was a step above the naked ground. It was not much but it was a place to rest, and wasn't that what she had wanted? She turned to thank Elphaba but found her gone already. She sat back on the bed. She wasn't sure if she felt safe. She wasn't sure if she felt home. But she had a roof over her head and a promise of a warm meal later. Maybe in the meantime, that would have to do.


End file.
